One Scream Away (29 page)

“Yeah, but the guy was a theater major,” Rick said. “Probably knows stage makeup. He could have ten more disguises.” He shrugged. “Guess he carries his own eyebrow pencil.”

Copeland turned to Neil, who’d begun pacing back and forth. “How’s Beth holding up?”

Neil blinked. “Scared shitless. Too stubborn to break.”

“What’s with the dog?”

O’Ryan perked up, looking for the story. “Dog? What happened?”

Neil slumped, still stewing over the pictures. “Beth got a call from Cheryl Stallings last night. Her dog disappeared.”

“Aw, geesh,” O’Ryan said. “What else could happen to that poor woman?”

“Bankes?” Harrison asked.

Neil shook his head. “That was my first thought, too, but Mrs. Stallings thinks her three-year-old left the gate open. Apparently it’s happened before, and Heinz has always come back.”

“So Denison’s taking it okay?”

Neil closed his eyes. Beth had blown off the news about Heinz like it was nothing. Just sucked it all up and offered to have sex with him. “Mrs. Stallings is putting up signs around the neighborhood,” he said. “Beth’s convinced the dog will turn up.”

“One paw at a time in the mail,” O’Ryan said.

“Get us a photo of the dog.” Copeland sighed. “Guess we oughta know what it looks like.”

“APBs on mutts,” Harrison said.

“Should we call in the canine unit?” O’Ryan quipped.

“So if you were trying to get close to Beth Denison, and you had money and knew makeup, how would you go about it?” Copeland posed that question to Standlin, who had just slipped in the door.

“You’d get into her profession, become someone she talked to, but not someone so close she’d know you well,” Standlin answered. “And you’d probably run into her, visit with her some, then go home and jerk off thinking about how well you’re fooling everyone.”

“Jesus,” Neil said. Then, a half-formed idea congealing in his brain, he straightened. “Wait a minute,” he said. “Go back to that close-up of the woman at Beth’s house.”

The head shot came onto the screen and Neil narrowed his eyes. “Did we ever get a good picture of Margaret Chadburne?”

A couple of brows furrowed, then Harrison said, “Ya think?”

Brohaugh’s fingers started flying. “There’s no driver’s license; we already know that. But I was just looking for a picture. I didn’t check Social Security or birth certificates.”

Neil felt as if his head was about to explode. Too many ideas, some so tangled he could hardly pull them out one at a time. But this one… Damn it, this one made sense.

“Nothing,” Brohaugh said. “I’ll check plane tickets from Boise…”

Copeland stood. He was vibrating. “God almighty, that woman doesn’t even exist.”

“It was Bankes all along,” Neil said. He tried to unclench his fingers but couldn’t. “Bankes didn’t
meet
Chadburne at those exhibitions. He created her there.”

“Have the photo lab do a mock-up of an old woman using Bankes’s face,” Copeland said to Brohaugh.

“He won’t use her disguise anymore,” Brohaugh said, “not if he thinks we’re onto it.”

“How will he know?” O’Ryan asked. “I can keep it out of the news.”

“No,” Neil said. “He knows, by now. Hell, he’s probably been laughing at us all along, waiting for it. All we had to do was start looking for Chadburne. Sooner or later we’d realize we were looking for someone who doesn’t exist.”

“Take the mock-up to Foster’s, anyway,” Copeland said. “Maybe someone saw her—Chadburne—go into the garages there and mess with the cars, something like that.” He rubbed a hand over his head. “I’m too old for this.”

“If we’re right,” Harrison said, “it explains a few things, but it doesn’t help us find Bankes now. He’s out there, and we won’t hear from him again until the next body shows up.”

“Yes, we will,” Neil said and looked at Standlin. “Because he won’t be able to stay away from Beth. Am I right?”

“He’ll contact her,” she agreed. “I don’t know how, but mark my words: He’ll find a way.”

G
o ahead, Beth. Scream.

Beth’s fingers sprang open, and the tiny curl of paper dropped to the table. She clutched herself, careful to not make a sound. Odd, she
did
want to scream, but she wouldn’t give him the pleasure of it, even unknowingly.

How had Bankes managed to get a note inside one of Mrs. Chadburne’s dolls? And a
Larousse
? Was it possible this
was
a Larousse doll?

Chadburne… Beth scrolled through everything she knew of the woman. She was one of Kerry’s suckers who had latched on to Beth after Beth went toe-to-toe with Kerry and saved Mrs. Chadburne a small fortune on a fake Benoit—the same one that had turned up yesterday with Lexi Carter. Chadburne was widowed, lived in Idaho, had a small doll collection that looked more and more priceless, and had called Beth from time to time for advice.

“Beth.”

She whirled. Suarez. “Didn’t you hear the door?” he asked.

“Oh, no. Uhm, sorry.”

He came in carrying a long box with embossed flowers on the lid, a red satin bow tied around it. “These just came for you. From guess who?” he asked, managing a grin. Then he looked at the dismembered doll. “Still looking, eh?”

Beth handed him the tiny scroll. He opened it, read it, and paled. “
Madre de Dios
,” he said and let it drop to the table. Keeping it clear of extra fingerprints, Beth realized, and she might have laughed at the idea if it weren’t so tragic. “Where did this come from?” he asked.

“In the wrist joint.” She showed him, and he cursed and put his arm around her. Beth almost didn’t notice. She was in a trance, the insidiousness of Bankes making her heart stand still.

“I need to call it in,” he said, and Beth stepped away. Her blood pulsed in her temples, and she ran her hand over the box Neil had sent. She wanted to be touched by his thoughtfulness, but all she could think about was Bankes. He was like a cancer, deep inside the bones, buried in her life and maybe in Margaret Chadburne’s. Beth had never known he was there.

Blankly, she pulled the ribbon and looked inside in the box.

Now, she screamed.

At the command center, the phone in Neil’s pocket rang. It was Suarez. Neil’s heart gave a thump. “What’s wrong?” Neil asked.

“Man,” he said, “me and Beth think maybe—”

The phone fumbled and Beth came on. “Neil. Get Abby! You have to get Abby out of there, all of them—”

“Beth, calm down. Tell me what hap—”

“He’s going to burn Abby. Get her out of there, Neil, please!”

“I am, Beth. I’m doing it.” To Rick, he waved a hand. “Call Covington. Make sure Abby’s okay.”

“No, no, that’s not enough!” Beth had heard him. “You have to get them out of there. She’ll burn! Neil, she’ll
burn
. There’s going to be a fire—”

Neil didn’t know what to do. He was frozen, helpless, thirty miles from the safe house and farther than that from Covington. And Beth sounded like she was cracking up.

Rick was on another phone, contacting Covington surveillance, saying something about Abby and the Stallingses, then nodding, catching Neil’s eye. “They’re okay,” he said. “They’re at the Stallings house.”

There’s going to be a fire…

Maybe Beth had a nightmare about a fire. It couldn’t have been Bankes—if he’d called Beth and threatened a fire, they would have had the trace by now. There couldn’t really be a fire.

“Beth, honey, we called Covington. Abby’s okay.”

“That’s not enough. Get them
out
!”

He thought about it for one more heartbeat, then turned to Rick, who still had the phone to his ear. “Tell them to clear out of the house.”

“What?”

“Evacuate. Call the fire department.”

Rick didn’t question it again; everyone else in the room stood silent, hardly breathing.

“We’re doing it, Beth.” He heard a sob, felt her hysteria reach through the phone lines and grip him by the throat. A minute passed, then another and another and another, then finally Rick was listening to something again.

“They’re out,” he said. “Two adults, two kids. They’re in the cruisers now.”

“Beth,” Neil said, “Abby’s in a police cruiser. The Stallingses, too. They’re all okay. There’s no fire.”

Beth collapsed into tears. Normal tears, though, not the delirium of a lunatic. They sounded like tears of relief.

Suarez came back: “She’s okay, man. Upset, but she’s okay now.” Neil closed his eyes. “But Sheridan?” Suarez said. “I think you better come see this.”

Standlin went with him, worried about Beth’s frame of mind; the rest of the task force kicked into high gear arranging for a safe house for the Stallings family, except for Rick, whose dad-gene kicked in. Neil heard him on the phone with Maggie, asking her to pull together some toys they could send to the safe house. Standlin had decided Abby should join Beth there. The condominiums where Beth was now being housed were as safe as anything, and just in case Covington’s net had been contaminated, they all agreed it would be good for Beth to have Abby back. God willing, the dog would wander back soon, too.

When they got to the condo, Beth was pacing, her arms crossed. Suarez intercepted them.

“She’s not nuts, Agent Standlin,” he said shortly.

Standlin was insulted. “I never suggested she was—”

“No, I mean, there’s a reason she wigged out. Wait’ll you see.”

Neil strode across the living room to Beth. She looked fragile and small to him again, yet when he touched her that steely round of strength pulsed through.

“Abby?” she asked on a thread that barely sufficed as a voice.

“I just got off the phone with the Covington team. They’re all in cars. It’s taking a while, ’cause they sent decoys, will make some switches. But Abby’s on her way here, and the Stallingses are being taken to another safe house. Your sister-in-law called her neighbor and asked her to put food out for Heinz, watch for him.”

Beth actually smiled; it made Neil’s heart melt a little more. “So, what’s going on?”

She reached into a flower box Neil hadn’t even noticed. She pulled out a doll. A child doll, an antique.

Scorched.

“Ah, jeez…”

“A kid came by,” said Suarez. “Some English dude paid him to deliver it. Your name was on the order.”

Neil pulled Beth into his arms. Christ, she’d thought Abby was going to burn. “She’s okay, Beth. There’s no fire.”

Beth returned his embrace then pulled back. “There’s something else,” she said. She showed him the dismembered Hannah doll and the scroll. Neil’s gut clenched.
He’ll contact her
, Standlin had said.
I don’t know how, but mark my words…

“Listen, Neil,” Beth was saying. “You know how I said these dolls reminded me of a set known as the Larousse dolls?”

He didn’t, but he shrugged.

“I think this doll
is
one of the Larousses. I don’t know how Margaret Chadburne could have gotten her hands on it, but we need to check with someone in the Larousse family or their insurance records. I would swear this doll came from their collection. And maybe some of the others.”

“Okay, honey, okay. That’s good. We’ll find out.” At this moment, Neil didn’t care. He was looking at the two new dolls, wondering about Bankes’s pattern.

He tugged his digital phone from his pocket, still holding Beth in one arm. He fumbled with the numbers, calling Copeland.

“Hey, Sheridan, I was just calling you,” Copeland said. “I—”

“Hold it. Beth got another doll. I’m sending it in with Suarez—”

“Fine,” Copeland interrupted. “But you need to come back, too.”

“Why?”

“Nine-one-one call just came in. Rick Sacowicz’s house is in flames.”

M
aggie and the kids weren’t home—Neil received that blessed news as he sped back to Arlington. Maggie had done exactly what Rick asked and gathered up some toys for Abby, then piled all four kids in the car to deliver the toys to Quantico so they could be taken to the safe house. By the time Neil arrived on the scene, the Sacowicz home was a hollowed-out shell of charred wood and bricks, fire-fighters poking at pockets of still-smoldering ash, an arson investigator searching out the source of the flames. Gasoline trail, it looked like, all around the porches, front and back. Simple, effective. Any teenager could do it, and as a police lieutenant, Rick had enough enemies that it wouldn’t be hard to cough up a list of suspects.

But they didn’t need a list of suspects.

Neil got out of the car. The kids had been taken inside a neighbor’s house, and Maggie stood in the street clutching her midriff, staring at what remained of her home. Neil opened his arms to her, then stopped cold at the sheer horror that wrenched her features.

“He’s not with you, is he?” she whispered.

Neil froze. He glanced at the house, back to Maggie, then at the driveway. Through the barricade of emergency vehicles, Rick’s car was partially visible. Neil’s throat closed. The sedan was dumped over the curb at a careless angle, trunk lagging into the street. The driver’s-side door stood open.

“Oh, God, no…”

“We weren’t here,” Maggie whispered through trembling lips. “We were out delivering the toys, but he must have thought—”

“No, man…”

A shout went up from inside the rubble. Neil stared as three firefighters jogged inside to answer the call. Two of them came back a minute later. They fetched a stretcher—and a body bag.

Maggie sank to her knees.

Neil dropped down beside her, and she grabbed his lapels as if she were drowning. Her sobs were like a meat hook in Neil’s chest, but that was nothing compared to the sight of Richie and Justin and Shawn filing off the neighbor’s front porch, a woman behind them bobbing up and down with the baby. The boys inched up behind their mom, a gurney wheeling past, and Maggie let go of Neil and opened her arms to them.

He backed away, and a cop in uniform drifted up beside him. “Gotta kill the motherfucker, now,” he said beneath his breath. “Gotta kill him.”

Neil did what he could—which was fucking nothing—for Maggie and the kids, staying on the phone with Quantico. Confirmation of the day’s breakthrough wasn’t long in coming: Margaret Chadburne didn’t exist.